Signature Design Video: The Road Trip: Part One

The summer after my seventh grade my mom, grandma Bette, my sister and I set out on a 3-week long road trip to visit all of my mom’s brothers that lived on the western side of the country. We also planned on seeing the Grand Canyon, Four Corners, Garden of the Gods, Pike’s Peak, the Great Sand Dunes, drive up the coast of California, tour Hearst Castle, meet up with our old neighbors, go to San Francisco, and finally visit Yellowstone.

We started out in Lucas, Kansas where S. P. Dinsmoor created his version of the Garden of Eden. He sculpted everything from concrete. I didn’t think this was particularly interesting because I had seen this before.

Photo credit: http://www.kansastravel.org/gardenofeden.htm

My sister had her learner’s permit at the time so the drive across Kansas wasn’t as smooth as I would have hoped. But once we hit the Colorado border it was back to my mom driving, thank God.

We finally made it to Denver and to Uncle Bill and Aunt Judy’s house. The first night we spent there was relaxing until everyone made me try shrimp for the first time. I was totally disgusted. The texture of shrimp makes me sick just thinking about it. The next night we went to a Japanese steakhouse that also had karaoke. My mom picked a song from “Beverly Hills Cop” and Judy said that she would help her sing it. Little did we know all Judy sang was “do whap do wa do whap do wa” over and over.

Our next major stop was my Uncle David and Aunt Jeri’s house but on the way there we drove to Garden of the Gods, the top of Pike’s Peak and the Great Sand Dunes. Of these three, the Great Sand Dunes was my favorite. I mean it’s a desert in the middle of the mountains. Garden of the Gods was also interesting but like everything else, it was crowded and you couldn’t take a picture without anyone else it. Pike’s Peak wasn’t so great because our car kept over heating on the drive up and I fell asleep on the drive down and my ears would not pop.